Democrats have problems. The next DNC chair is probably not who fixes them.

There are times when the election of a new party chair becomes a fight about everything, faction versus faction, with grudges about a lost election being worked out awkwardly in public.

That’s not this race to lead the Democratic National Committee.

The party’s agony about its second loss to Donald Trump is largely unrelated to the DNC, despite its role in protecting Biden from a primary challenge. (Like Republicans four years earlier, the party endorsed its president for re-election and didn’t sanction any debates for his longshot challengers.) The key decisions about the next presidential election, like whether to restore an Iowa-first primary calendar, won’t be made for years.

“No one is blaming a single state party for losing this presidential election,” said Carol Fowler, the former chair of the South Carolina Democratic Party, as Harrison stood smiling in the back of the room.

In Scottsdale, where the chair candidates began collecting the signatures they needed to compete — at least 40 of 448 active DNC members — the debate was more limited to tactics, media outreach, and whether the party had relied on consultants and vendors who didn’t know how to win.

“We will competitively re-bid every single contract, from the office supplies up to the seven- and eight-figure deals with consultants,” said Skoufis, who touted his ability to win Trump voters in a Hudson Valley district. “I know there are some here. Many of you have been giving me death stares the last couple of days. Get ready to sharpen your pencils.”

The party will elect new leadership, from the chair down to the treasurer and secretary, on Feb. 1. It’ll sponsor four forums for the chair candidates next month, taking more control over a process that veered into parody eight years ago — including a televised CNN debate where candidates who’d never been involved with the party accused it of rigging the 2016 primary against Bernie Sanders.

While O’Malley declared his candidacy first, and while some well-known party figures are still considering whether they’ll run, the Democrats gathered at a Hilton in Scottsdale were mostly focused on Martin and Wikler. Martin’s “YES WE KEN” signs papered the walls of a hospitality suite; when O’Malley approached one Martin supporter with his petition, asking if he could be his “second choice,” he got a signature but was politely told that the second choice was Wikler.

“Ken’s been just so wonderful, supportive, and encouraging,” said Arizona Democratic Party chair Yolanda Bejarano, wearing a Martin button on her lapel. “He shares his courage with all the chairs and vice chairs, and helps us think through any problems.”

O’Malley, whose electoral career ended with a 2016 presidential bid, shared his slogan with the crowd — “get up for greatness” — and said that his experience leading the Democratic Governors Association prepared him for another rebuild.

“I am a proven operational turnaround leader, and I have proven it at every level,” he said, recounting how he brought a literal kitchen table to campaign events during his 2010 re-election.

Martin and Wikler had a more familiar story to tell, and an overlapping pitch: Full-time, long-term support for party-building in every state and territory. Martin emphasized that he had not lost a single statewide race since taking over the party; Wikler described how Wisconsin Democrats had multiplied their fundraising and organizing for a multi-year strategy that flipped the state supreme court and broke a Republican legislative gerrymander.

“If we fight everywhere, year-round, with a permanent campaign, then in these next four years, we will not only win elections in every state, but we will set ourselves up to prevent the rigging of our country before the 2030 Census,” Wikler said.

Like O’Malley and Skoufis, Wikler had just five minutes to pitch the full room before the microphone was passed to candidates seeking other offices. In an interview, Martin said that Wikler had done a “great job” in Wisconsin, and was “bringing ideas to the table.” But the real competition hadn’t started yet.

“There’s probably gonna be more people in the race, right? But it certainly hasn’t impacted me,” he said. “It hasn’t changed my trajectory.”

A lot of coverage and speculation about the DNC race has focused on people who might run — Rahm Emanuel, defeated Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown, Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow. Before the meeting started, Latino Democratic strategist Chuck Rocha ended his flirtation with a bid, after a series of high-profile interviews where he said the party had lost touch with working class voters of all races.

But the early frontrunners are relatively low-key state party leaders, not charismatic politicians and outsiders, because there’s less of a desire to blow up the national party infrastructure. There is a sort of meta story here, about how much of the Democrats’ challenges right now are media and messaging — not nuts and bolts operations, where their fundraising and turnout are generally seen as effective.

When I asked DNC members what the party could have done better in 2024, the most common answer was that the Trump-led GOP had found more non-traditional voters, for less money.

“I was the Bernie Sanders surrogate director in 2020, and we never paid our surrogates,” said Shasti Conrad, the chair of the Washington state Democrats. “I heard that the campaign spent $5 million on Megan thee Stallion. And I was like — what?”

But there is no sign of the public self-flagellation that Democrats underwent after 2016, when they spent months on a distracting chair contest and more than a year changing primary rules to appease Sanders and his supporters. That’s notable, because the 2024 primary wasn’t exactly a success.

The decision to put South Carolina first on the primary calendar, and award no delegates for competing in Iowa or New Hampshire, played a role in Robert F. Kennedy’s decision to bolt the party — and eventually endorse Donald Trump. Biden’s remaining challengers, Dean Phillips and Marianne Williamson, were denied ballot access in some state primaries; they sat by helplessly in July when Biden abandoned his campaign, and his delegates gave the nomination to Kamala Harris.

Why aren’t these major topics in the DNC race? Well: They don’t really have to worry about Biden anymore, and all of that happened as the swing state Democratic primaries remained in good shape. Fowler’s remarks said it all — the Democrats who will elect a new chair next year don’t really get any of the blame for the black swan debacle that sunk them this year. They are out of power, but not in the wilderness.